Why Is Walmart Cleaning House In India? 56 Executives Fired
Retail giant Walmart (WMT) has fired a total of 56 executives in India as it looks to restructure its business in the country.
According to Reuters, the firings came as Walmart looks to make a bigger shift to e-commerce sales. Walmart currently sells goods to local shopkeepers in India, over consumers, through 28 wholesale stores it currently operates in the country.
Walmart has already invested in India’s e-commerce segment, with a $16 billion acquisition of Flipkart. Flipkart is an online marketplace that also offers streaming services. The purchase of Flipkart was the biggest global acquistion by Walmart made in 2018. The deal also included digital payment company PhonePe, which Walmart at one time was looking to spin off into its own entity.
A number of the firings came from Walmart’s real estate division, which is tasked with store expansions, and reportedly failed to meet growth expectations. A total of eight of the firings included senior management positions, according to the news outlet.
Krish Iyer, president and CEO of Walmart India told Reuters about the firings that “We are also looking for ways to operate more efficiently, which requires us to review our corporate structure to ensure that we are organized in the right way.”
The fired executives were offered severance benefits, Iyer said. Walmart currently employs about 5,300 workers in India.
Shares of Walmart stock were down 0.73% as of 12:55 p.m. EST on Monday.
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